The Waves of Motherhood

I didn’t always enjoy motherhood as much as I do this way, under the sun. As I plant my smile somewhere in between my children’s cartwheeling shadows on the sunlit grass today, I am brought back to six years ago when motherhood first greeted me like a rush of huge waves; beautiful in pictures but surprisingly rough. I remember mourning what felt like a loss of freedom somewhere three weeks into the journey of mothering a newborn. I remember wondering why I didn’t instantly enjoy motherhood like in the pictures they painted. I remember wondering if I was going to feel that way forever and if I was ever cut out for this. And I remember, someone telling me that “someday, you will find a phase that becomes your favourite”. Maybe the waves would be a little less rough there, I thought. And those words have never rang truer today, and a couple of other times over the past years, in fact. Because motherhood, like other things in this temporal life, isn’t a constant. And not everyone fits into a cookie-cutter mould of a mother. I may not have found myself in one of those pictures where a mother smiles peacefully into her newborn’s eyes. But I am loving these sunburnt pictures we’ve painted together of us cartwheeling our ways on the grass. I have never enjoyed motherhood as much as I do this way, under the sun. And if you (future me included) find yourself drowning somewhere in between these rough waves of motherhood, remember that “someday, you will find a phase that becomes your favourite”. The waves aren’t any less rough there, but you’ll just find a favourite way to swim.